Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho has criticised Luke Shaw for the wage demands he asked from the club before joining Manchester United.
The 19-year-old joined Louis Van Gaal’s side this Summer from Southampton after the clubs agreed a £27million fee, and the player agreed to a contract worth £100k-a-week.
Shaw looked likely to have to choose between United and Chelsea this Summer, after both clubs declared their interest in January, but once the left-back revealed his wage demands to the West London club, they quickly cooled their interest and looked elsewhere.
When talking about missing out on Shaw, Mourinho admitted that the wage he wanted was way too high for such a young footballer.
“If we pay to a 19-year-old boy what we were being asked for, for Luke Shaw, we are dead,” said Mourinho. “We kill our stability with financial fair play. We kill the stability in our dressing room.
“Because when you pay that much to a 19-year-old kid – good player, fantastic player – but when you pay that amount of money, the next day, we’d have players knocking on our door.
“They’d be saying, ‘How is it possible? I play for this club 200 games and won this and that; how come a 19-year-old comes here and gets more money than I get?’
“It would kill immediately our balance and we don’t allow that.
“So, you can say Filipe’s much less expensive. And a guy like Filipe Luis played for Brazil, won titles in Spain, won European competition, played Champions League semi-final – this guy is much cheaper than an English young lad. And is he good for our average wages, yes he is.”
Written by Alex Batt – @AlexBatt – @AlexsArticles
